Times are tough, and people served by post offices in Elyria, North Ridgeville, Grafton, Wellington and Oberlin opened their hearts on Saturday with an abundance of food for those in need.

Postal carriers – along with retired and off-duty carriers – picked up 103,500 pounds of food left on front porches or by mailboxes in the 17th annual “Stamp Out Hunger” food drive.

“This is great,” said Bill Rolfe, president of Local 196 Cascade Branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers. “People know the economy is bad in this area and are looking to help one another out.”

This year`s collection was about 10 percent higher than last year`s total of 93,200 pounds, he said.

While carriers get a workout every day carrying magazines and other heavy mail, this day is special, Rolfe said.

“Everybody complains about it going up to the day, but then all the carriers are competing to see how much food they`ll bring in,” he said.

After picking up the food on their routes, carriers return to their post offices to shuttle the boxes and bags to food pantries and hot meal programs.

Carriers filled Rolfe`s red pickup five times for trips to the Salvation Army.

About 70,000 pounds of food collected by the Elyria post office goes to the Salvation Army.

He said the post office in North Ridgeville had a collection of 22,000 pounds to be donated to Community Care. Folks along the North Ridgeville routes donated about 9,000 pounds last year, Rolfe said.

In Grafton, about 4,600 pounds of food goes to Second Harvest Food Bank while in Wellington, 3,700 pounds goes to Well Help. Oberlin`s 3,800 pounds of donations will help a church`s Hot Meal program, Rolfe said.

The drive is held annually on the second Saturday in May.

Other Lorain County post offices also participated in the drive.

In Lorain, donations go to the Salvation Army center on Broadway, while food collected in the Amherst area goes to Second Harvest Food Bank.

Contact Cindy Leise at 329-7245 or cleise@chroniclet.com.

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